Comments on: Ping pedantry

By: Darren

Darren — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 22:17:17 +0000

@14 – best movie ever? I don’t recall that line being in Team America

I know, I know, The Hunt For Red October… which I guess proves Bill is right (as usual).

By: tom

tom — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 12:38:09 +0000

And the best use of the word “ping” (from the best movie ever)

“Give me a ping, Vasili. One ping only, please.”

p.s. Nice theme

By: Richard Schwartz

Richard Schwartz — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 01:31:36 +0000

I can assure you that ‘ping me’ has been in widespread use outside of IBM for quite a few years. I probably first heard it used by a network guy close to 20 years ago.

By: Darren

Darren — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 08:26:49 +0000

@12 – I don’t mind if people use ‘ping’. I’m more amused than anything else, but I’m also interested if this is happening outside of IBM too. ‘Leverage’ used as a verb was the first bad habit that I noticed inside IBM, it spread and now happens everywhere. And now we have that another word used in IBM (begins with ‘c’ and used for reviews), the meaning of which has completely been warped.

By: Dave Hay

Dave Hay — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:18:35 +0000

Darren

So what term would you use instead of ping ? Would “Sametime” someone, or would you “send them an instant message via IBM Lotus Workplace Instant Messaging and Web Conferencing ( Sametime )” ?

Personally, I’d prefer to “ping” them, but I’m also quite happy to “slap” them instead

By: Richard Schwartz

Richard Schwartz — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 23:53:15 +0000

When I get a ping, I respond with a pong.

By: Darren

Darren — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 21:39:16 +0000

Thanks for taking it so seriously everyone. Next week we’ll discuss the term “tongue in cheek”.

By: Karl-Henry Martinsson

Karl-Henry Martinsson — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 16:04:20 +0000

As Bill says in @5: The term “ping “originally comes form anti-submarine warfare. The computer/network term comes from the fact that (just as with sonar), you send a signal (accoustic for ASW or electronic for computers) and wait for a response.

I only use the term “ping” when I am sending something with an expectation of getting a response back.
E.g. “I just pinged John about the server upgrade status”.
You can of cause use different carriers for your “ping”, could be phone, email, IM, SMS message, etc. But a message you send out with a reasonable expectation to geta (fairly quick and short) response can be called a “ping”, IMHO.
However, I would not use the term for any email or IM you send out. No matter if it says “ping”, “bing” or “you got mail” on the other side.

By: Stephan H. Wissel

Stephan H. Wissel — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:41:42 +0000

Ah… may I introduce the concept of “term overload”. The same word can have different meanings. Like: bank (financial institution), bank (edge of a river), bank (turning movement – military use), bank (rely on). My favourite: AND. Give me the customers in London AND Paris vs. Give me the customers with a BMW AND an expiring contract. The former resolves into (WHERE CITY = ‘London’ OR CITY = ‘Paris’).
AND (meaning: here is an additional argument): Thomas and Bill point out, that a lot computer terms (ping, thread, task etc.) had meanings before. I like the new mail ping. So “ping” would mean: bring to my attention.

By: Darren

Darren — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 14:02:04 +0000

@5 – I’ve not yet seen anyone piloting a submarine around the office.